The Classical Debate about Rhetoric and Historiography in the Historia Augusta

In this chapter, I analyze the theory and practice regarding the relationship between historiography and rhetoric as reflected in the fourth-century collection of imperial biographies, named the Historia Augusta (HA). The unknown author/editor of the HA explicitly comments upon the position of the biographer in the field of historiographers as well as rhetoricians, thereby uttering contradictory statements concerning the degree of historical reliability in both genres. At the same time, the author practices rhetoric himself by interweaving numerous speeches of his own making in the historiographical narrative. This procedure results in a creative reception of the classical debate about the relationship between historiography and rhetoric as laid out by Cicero in several of his theoretical works. Cicero, being steeped in rhetorical theory as well as practice, served as an important model for the author of the HA in many respects, and therefore the former’s theoretical reflections may inform the analysis of the same debate within the HA-biographies. On the practical side, the author of the HA uses many elements from the historical narrative in order to construct his speeches, which not only concords with classical historiographical practice, but also with Cicero’s prescripts of rhetorical practice to build up a speech (exaedificatio) from words (verba) using the elements (res) needed for the plea. The relationship between historical res and rhetorical verba is a recurring theme in the HA, the occurrence of which may directly be traced back on the classical debate about rhetoric in historiography.